The Hunt ✓

👑63| Whirlwind

                            🌸🌸

The crowd becomes noisier than it currently was a few minutes back. Loud gasps escape the petrified mouths of the townspeople who stare at the four dead bodies lying beside each other.

   The first in line is a man probably in his late thirties. Bruised up, his face grooms up and contain smears with traces of blood. His lifeless eyes stare into the sky while his neck has a large bite mark embodying it.

  The other two are women who look in their youthful exuberance, so certainly they are young enough not to be married yet.

Although their pale emotionless face has no trace of blood like the men, the shoulder part of their robes are a bit torn and battered up from the top to their bottom.

  Their black hair spreads against the bare floor with their blood imbrued on it. An ounce of dripping blood was still left over their necks but they lay  cold dead, unable to tell the cause of their deaths.

This time, the look in the eyes of the bystanders isn't like usual. For the first time, there is so much fear and certainty in their eyes.

  "In Ah..."!

  "Jin Woo"!

  "Se Ho"!

  "Hye Myung"!

  Four names begin rambling under the lips of three women and one man in unison in sobs. Everyone turns to see more of the commotion. Their whispers increase drastically as they see the family of the victims come around.

  "Aigoo. That man was right wasn't he?"

Two other women who stand beside her turn their necks with shock carefully plastered on their faces.

  One of them throws her hands down and a short laughter betrays her mouth.

"What are you saying! How can there be a va-"

Her voice comes to a stop when her eyes fall over the dead bodies, one by one recognizing the sequential patterns on their necks.

They are the same and obviously not done by a wild animal. Their bodies wouldn't be retrieved if they were actually killed by a wild animal in the forest.

She suddenly stays quiet and runs her eyes over all the bodies. At that moment, she realizes what her friend is talking about.

  Severe footsteps take over the gasps and whispers for a while. Palace guards rush out of the palace gate and begin marching towards the bodies with mats in their hands.

  Everyone resumes staring at them keenly while they move forward in unison. The victims keep crying and holding on to the bodies. Their grief doesn't let them notice the guards are coming over.

   "Why are they here!"

Before the rest can figure the cause of the uninvited visit, the guards pull their swords out and cross it.

 One of them walks up to the dead bodies and lowers his finger over one of the bodies to check his pulse. He stands up on his feet and sighs with a nod to call over the other guards.

   "Let's go. Take them away for investigation!"

The guards bow and yell in agreement while putting their swords away.

 "That's all! You have to tell us what's going on here! That man was telling the truth right! There's a vampire in this town!"

 One of the women who cries over the young dead woman gets up wiping her tears with her lower arm before she turns to the crowd with hatred in her eyes. She picks up a stone and flings it over to the leader of the guards.